Colonel ZTfoomas Cborntou 85 



already been taken off his hands by a dashing young 

 naval officer who had come into a fortune. In a certain 

 law-suit, in which a heavy claim of the Colonel's against 

 a foolish young man of property in the neighbourhood 

 was resisted on the ground that the defendant had been 

 cheated, Alicia took a prominent part, and, in letters 

 addressed to the newspapers, reviled her old protector 

 like a very vixen. On reading these effusions the 

 Colonel, I think, must have been thankful that he was 

 well quit of the " Nymph of Norwich." 



But Thornton still had his place at Boythorpe, 

 which he had bought from Mr. Bilby in 1791. He 

 had built there, at a cost of 10,000, a handsome house, 

 which he christened Falconer's Hall, with fine stabling, 

 and accommodation for his famous hawks. Situated 

 among the wolds of the East Riding, about twelve 

 miles from Scarborough, Boythorpe afforded excellent 

 scope for coursing and hawking. And there the Colonel 

 held high revel with his friends, varying the sport and 

 festivities by annual sporting excursions to Scotland and 

 occasional visits to London. 



In 1806 the Colonel at last took to himself a lawful 

 wife in the person of Miss Eliza Cawston, the daughter 

 of a gentleman farmer of Munden, in Essex. This lady 

 bore him in 1807 a son, William Thomas Thornton, his 

 only legitimate offspring. In the following year Colonel 

 Thornton let Falconer's Hall, and leaving Yorkshire, 

 where the farmers were breaking up the wolds for corn 

 crops, and thus spoiling them for hawking, betook himself 

 to Wiltshire, where he leased Spye Park. Traditions still 

 linger there of the wonderful sport he had with his hawks 



